Drowned in a Sea of Insanity
by CrowAggro
Summary: Unhinged and alone Reno needs serious help, but who will be there in the end when it's all gotten too far out of control, because someone it going to suffer.
1. Tearing down the walls

Title: Drowned in a Sea of Insanity

Author: Neko-Jin of the stars

Sumary: Unhinged and desperate Reno needs help, and as his condition rapidly worsens who will be left to pick up the pieces, because somebody is going to suffer.

Warning: slight violence, minor language and a large dose of mental anguish.

Disclaimer: I own nothing affilated with any of the Final Fantasies what-so-ever. (Unfortunately!)

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Soaked to the skin he trudged the cold, desolate streets lost inside his own mind. He'd been walking the same route for several hours and he hadn't even noticed. He trawled the city with none of his usual swagger, none of the confidence that's hit you ten minutes before he even entered your line of sight. He didn't even stop when a large, hulking shadow engulfed a terrified young woman. She couldn't fight back, and that monstrous shadow man knew it. So when he'd finished with her he just left her there, sobbing, screaming for help.

And Reno gave her none. Rape meant nothing to him anymore. He'd seen it all, heard it all, hell he'd lived through it all before. Besides, he'd seen a hell of a lot worse too. So why then, did he feel the need to go back, to help her up and to tell her he was here to help. Why did he feel like he owed this woman a debt, why did he feel guilty for what someone else had done to her? He shook his head, disgusted with himself, but carried on walking anyway.

It was like he was trapped in this vicious circle, forever destined to constantly backtrack over paths he's already walked before. He couldn't stop now. '_Why break the habit of a lifetime_?' he thought to himself miserably. After another hour or so of relentless walking he decided to call it a day. Right after he'd had a quick drink of course.

After standing behind this damned bar all day Tifa felt like she needed a drink herself. She didn't bother looking up when she heard the door swing open.

"Stupid damn drunks." She muttered darkly.

"I might be a drunk Tif's, but I sure as hell ain't stupid." Recognising the voice and the stupid nickname she whipped her head round sharply. She wasn't sure what she felt when she saw the pitiful mess in front of her, pity mostly she thought.

"Well Tif's, you gonna stand there all day lookin' pretty or are you gonna serve us, yo?" Shaking her head angrily she chided herself for thinking that the stupid Turk would ever change. '_Still_,' she mused, '_he really doesn't look good, and there is **something** drasticallydifferent about him_.' Forcing a smile she tried to make polite conversation whilst she poured his drink. "So Reno, where's Rude, aren't you too joined at the hip?" She instantly regretted asking. Reno froze, arms and shoulders tensed, and his head bowed as though he were readying himself for a physical attack. When he did glance her way he'd visibly paled, and it was only now the lusty barmaid realised to what extent Reno had changed.

Thick, black rings shadowed his red rimmed, blood shot eyes. His normally cheerful, handsome face now looked drawn, tired and tense. He looked like a ghost of the man she once knew. True enough she'd never particularly liked any of the Turks, but he'd always been rather sociable, and it was impossible not to like him to some extent. He was just one of those people. Or at least **had **been one of those people.

"Just shut up and pour the damn drink Tifa." She paused, taken aback at the gruff, aggressive attitude. Cloud and Vincent entered the room just in time to hear Reno's outburst, and suffice to say cloud was not impressed."Listen Reno, just because you're feeling down doesn't mean you have the right to take it out on Tifa." The Turk cast his eyes in Clouds direction and shot him daggers.

"Oh, so the identity stealer speaks does he?" Reno snarled, taking some twisted satisfaction at the horrified expression that warped Cloud's face. The blonde stepped forwards and as he did so Reno grabbed the drink out of Tifa's unresisting hands then necked it before hurling the empty glass at the wall behind Cloud's head. As the glass exploded into a thousand tiny shards, slowly, the renegade Turk unfurled himself from his bar stool visibly shaking, even in the poor light of the bar. Vincent watched silently, eyes narrowed, not with distaste at the Turks actions, but with concern about his state of mind. Within moments of standing Cloud had fastened his stiff, coarse hands around the taller mans neck. Nothing happened for a moment that seemed to stretch for an eternity. Finally, Reno moved his strangely effeminate hands towards his neck and placed them over Clouds pulling them away from his long, slender neck. Silence reigned supreme until Tifa conquered it with a faux-cheerful voice. The one she used on the children when they'd had a bad dream and she had to explain that the monsters in their heads weren't really real.

"Hey everyone, why don't we just calm down and have a drink? I think we could all do with one."

Reno sniggered and muttered something barely inaudible under his breath.

"What was that Reno?" The blonde demanded. He was normally a very calm, very patient man, but Reno was beginning to grate on his very last nerve. Vincent made a move to intervene but Cloud waved him off. Both Tifa and Vincent shared a 'look'. The sort of look that said without being voiced '_Neither of them are going to back down until one of them gets hurt_.' Vincent hovered beside Cloud, unsure of where the best place to stand might be. As far away as possible from these too would be most logical, but someone would need to intervene when things got out of hand.

"I said," Reno said, his voice barely a whisper, "how fucking stupid are you offering a bunch of temper mental, hot heads alcohol. Unless you get off on watching all the drunks fight. You sleazy bitch!" It seemed to the other stunned, patrons that Reno didn't actually realise his voice had grown louder and louder until he was practically screaming at them.

He heard it before he felt her palm connect with his face at lightening speed. The resounding '_smack'_ caused even the stoic Vincent Valentine to flinch. Reno hadn't even noticed she'd moved. Panting slightly she waved a finger, in what he thought she must think was a menacing way. He couldn't stop the mirthless grin spread across his face. As soon as Reno had insulted Tifa, Vincent had glanced at Cloud and had seen the murderous glint in his eyes. There would not be blood shed tonight, he wouldn't allow it. Before Reno knew what was going happening, a pair of smooth, strong hands had his frail arms pinned behind his back. The sudden contact had the crimson haired man hissing and screaming and writhing like a wild animal. Vincent pushed on though, forcing the deranged Turk slowly towards the door. Somehow, with astonishing strength the seemingly fragile young man managed to free an arm. Vincent steeled himself, ready for the blows.

The attack never came.

Instead, he felt slight pressure on his arm as the would be assailant held tighter. Puzzled, Vincent remained still, he could feel Reno shaking, he could see the tremor reverberating through the vulnerable, brittle body. And then they heard him, his voice ringing clear, cutting through the alcoholic smog that filled the bar.

"I can't go out there,_ I can't go back_!" He screamed. A plea so desperate he almost cried it. Cloud and Tifa were listening intently now, they stopped their advance. "Please, you can't make me go back." His voice barely rising above a whisper now. As sobs racked his entire body, the young Turk still desperately clung to Vincent, burying his burning face into the elder mans chest. Vincent glanced at Tifa who stood rooted to the spot. She looked on the verge of tears, whilst Clouds bewildered face tried to make sense of the scene that had just played out before them.

After a while, the frail Turk forcefully pushed himself away from the vampires chest, shame and anger at his own stupid, irrational action blazing across his face. Vincent let his arms fall limply by his sides hesitant to move in case he provoked another random outburst from the obviously unhinged young man.

"S-sorry, about that…" Reno muttered, his eyes downcast, and his voice husky and hoarse. Tifa rushed forwards and flung her arms round his thin waist. Reno remained unresponsive, his eyes slightly glazed and emotionless. Remembering herself, Tifa let go slowly and stepped back. Cloud remained statuesque, his face betraying a mixture of emotions ranging from concerned to downright terrified. He had never seen Reno like this before. None of the had. And as far as any of them knew, he was stone cold sober too.

"I should go now. Sorry I caused you all so much trouble." Sending an apologetic smile Vincent's way Reno turned to leave, visibly bristling as he pulled open the door to the big wide world. Glancing out onto those depressing, ruthless streets he remembered why he'd taken refuge in that bar in the first place, the one place on earth where he knew there were people out there that would listen if he tried to explain. But he couldn't do it to himself. He couldn't say it. That would be like admitting it was true. Realising he hadn't moved from the doorway he tried to grin back at the three who he knew were staring intently at him, begging for him to hurry up and leave. His grin failed miserably, the muscles in his face refused to work, so he merely grunted a goodbye.

Tifa was worried. Cloud was worried too. So was Vincent but he had already returned to his makeshift crypt in the basement, he'd probably been the most disturbed by Reno than any of them. She didn't realise she was crying until Cloud pulled her close, and brushed her tears away.

"We should have made him stay. We shouldn't have let him leave like that." Cloud said nothing, part of him agreed with her, but a large part of him was glad he'd left. Reno was not all there. He never really had been in Cloud's opinion, but now, he was dangerously close to falling over the edge. Fading into dark recessed of his mind, the place where the demons lurked.

Safe in his coffin Vincent mulled over the evening. His mind seemed heavy and back logged with information and emotions. He didn't know what it was about him, maybe it was the desperation in the faded aquamarine eyes, or maybe it was the anguish that drenched his words and the way he spoke in that pitiful hopeless voice. He'd sounded like a lost child, battered and bruised, dragged through life in the worst possible way and dumped in the midst of strangers. People who were kind and contented with their lives. People who couldn't imagine the scale of the bloody wars that raged inside that pretty little head.

People who were living in another world, had no chance of understanding the horrors that poor tortured soul was putting himself through. But Vincent knew because they both shared the same world.

He hadn't made it to the apartment. The rain was still hammering into the ground and his legs had given up. His hands were too numb to pull himself up and his voice had already evaporated. So instead of fighting it, he crawled to the alley nearby and let sleep claim him. He wasn't actually sure if he was dreaming anymore, or whether he was just waking up, because his life was a constant nightmare, and it made no difference whether he slept or not. He could not escape the pain.

The crowd swelled. A sea of flesh. Rumours travelled on the crest of the human waves, passing the message. On the outskirts, they heard the rumours and with horrified understanding pushed against the tide. It took superhuman strength but they finally broke through. They wished they'd stayed away. As the three friends glanced around, they noticed that the entire inner circle was filled with the people that should have been there for him. Themselves included.

"You were so in love with the sound of your own voice! You never let him speak, you never let him finish! It was your fault, ALL YOUR FAULT!" He raged waving the gun in his hand around as though it were nothing. He stalked away from the young blonde man in the pure white suit, and vehemently spat in the direction of the two black clad body guards. The pretty blonde burst out crying, her partner, a handsome Wutain man placed an arm around her shoulders and drew her closer. He too looked ready to cry. There should have been another man there with them. But there wasn't. Not anymore.

Teeth bared, his matted hair had been pulled out of it's pony tail in odd places and whipped across his face every time he turned around. And every time he turned around it seemed he found a new enemy. He was seeing them wherever he looked now.

His manic gaze settled upon them, they remained silent as he flitted across the heart of the circle stopping mere feet away from them. He said nothing for a moment, yet the hand with the gun never stopped moving. A puzzled frown danced across his insanity warped features. He tapped the gun against his head, as though trying to remember something vital. A wide, toothy grin broke out over his face, yet his sudden glee managed to chill the three companions to the bone. He raised the gun and pointed directly at Vincent. The gunslinger noted the safety was off but remained stock still. He didn't want to give Reno reason to pull the trigger.

Silence raged across that sector of the city, it seemed everyone was watching, each person unknowingly holding their breath. They were waiting for a casualty. Vincent was sure it would be him.

"You didn't try to stop me leaving." The young man said, a confused tone replacing the manic one he'd been using previously. The gun remained perfectly poised to put a bullet through the vampires heart.

"But you weren't exactly pushing me away either. Thank you." And for the first time, Vincent saw Reno smile, a small sad smile. The smile of a little, lost child who had just realised he wasn't alone in the world. What happened next seemed to take forever to play out. First, the gun had changed positions, and was now slowly working it's way up the crimson Turks body, before finally resting against his temple. A bullet flared, and the world exploded around him.

Reno's gun fell from his limp hand clattering at his feet as he slumped forwards, his legs unable to support him anymore. Tseng lowered his gun, whilst the entire inner circle erupted into action. Tifa rushed forwards using a piece of material Vincent had just ripped from his cloak to them the blood flowing from the bullet wound in his leg. Cloud quickly dialled an ambulance, he was amazed nobody had thought to do this before when the gun toting maniac had first appeared on the scene, screaming and yelling, threatening to shoot.

The two Turks hovered uncertainly by their master. Tseng and Elena torn between staying with their friend and staying by their master eventually rushed to their fallen friend, both weeping openly, terrifying the nearby spectators who knew their background, who knew they were Turks. Chaos ran rampant throughout the ocean of people as rumour and fact became an indistinguishable blur, causing those simple minded people to flee and to scream unsettled and confused. All apart from that small group at the very centre, in the heart of the fear and confusion, because they knew that the real danger had been taken care of.

And yet they all prayed he'd pull through.

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Neko-Jin: thanks for reading :3 It would mean a lot though if you could tell me what you think, i'm considering making this into an actual story, but I dunno... Reviews with your thoughts etc would be VERY much appreciated :D


	2. Of Shackles and Blades

Title: Drowned in a Sea of Insanity

Author: Neko-Jin of the stars

Summary: Unhinged and desperate Reno needs help, and as his condition rapidly worsens who will be left to pick up the pieces, because somebody is going to suffer.

Warning: violent/ disturbing images, and a large dose of mental anguish.

Disclaimer: I own nothing affilated with any of the Final Fantasies what-so-ever. (Unfortunately!)

Also, this chapter is a **lot** shorter than the previous, mainly because there's only so much depression a person can write about before it starts getting too much!

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He felt them touching him. He felt the, vile, unnatural latex hands pressing him down, further into his nightmares, pinning him down while they readied their needles and their scalpels. He felt the incision. They'd cut straight through to the bone. Screeching and Shrieking he fought desperately, clawing and tearing at the restraints holding him prisoner. He felt them again. Slowly, rubbery hands crawled up his thigh, cold, clammy fingers skipped over his jutting hip bone and stroked his stomach, his chest and slowly inched their way up to his exposed throat. Screaming histerically the crimson prisioner struggled and writhed against his bonds, and all to no avail. The dead hand clamped itself over his wide, wailing mouth. Darkness reigned in his mind. And all Reno could hear was the sounds of a knife tearing through, warm, living flesh. The needle slid under his skin, and pain exploded within his mind.

"Why's he still screaming, why hasn't he woken up yet, WHY AREN'T YOU DOING ANYTHING!?" The tense, irate raven haired Turk yelled. Doctors, nurses and friends alike flinched at the raw, cutting, uncivilised, entirely un-Tseng like tone of voice. What happened to the calm, collected, esteemed leader of the Turks? Elena placed a trembling hand on her superiors shoulder, a move that had she made under any other circumstances, would have resulted in broken fingers and a shattered palm. It was Tifa who spoke next, her normally rich, vibrant voice dulled and soft.

"Shouldn't somebody get hold of Rude?"

That was when their world crumbled around them. All those hidden little truths, the words no-one had dared speak, not even Reno. Especially not Reno. If he said them, if he uttered those words he'd be accepting it, and he couldn't ever do that, not now, not ever, not until the day he died would he say it.

But he was already dying on the inside.

The demons settled, the gloved hands melted away and as the haze set in Reno felt the restraints slip away. It's all right not to feel again. He welcomed the numbness that had set in, soothing his burnt out mind. He could still see those demons though, out of the corners of his eyes they lurked, hounding him, waiting patiently. He could see those shackles again, snaking their way across the ground with a metallic hiss, and the syringes, they tore through his skull. Never stopping, never hesitating, they wanted him dead. And as he slipped into obscurity he felt a warm, sticky heat on the back of his neck and heard harsh, ragged intakes of breath. He couldn't escape them. All these dead things, all this rot and decay, the unreal attacking him from the inside out. He couldn't trust his mind any more than he could trust the real world. Maybe it was time to end the fight.

The lights flared over head as the room swarmed with methodical, sterile white coated doctors and nurses, all armed with various implements of torture. They couldn't watch. Their eyes told their brains that Reno was being helped. That these white clothed angels would save him. What the brain sent back though were images of a crimson haired young man drowning in a sea of crimson, the pristine ,white walls doused in the violent, vibrant blood. Yet they couldn't turn away, a macabre fascination pulling them in, drawing them deeper into the unstable Turks deranged and demented world of torture and monsters of shackles and blades.

He looked so innocent, so still and quiet. And yet beneath the surface they knew a war raged, sanity had already lost, leaving madness to run riot on the battlefield.

They shouldn't be watching. They should turn away, right now. All of them. Cloud, Tifa and Vincent who had seen death first hand, Tseng and Elena who had carried it out and Rufus who'd ordered it. They should all just let him go, what life could that poor soul possibly return to? A life of drip feeding and rubber tipped corners. A life where the only knifes available were plastic and taken away straight after use, a world where reality was taboo. It sounded perfect. But the novelty would wear off, and the cocktails of drugs they'd pour down his throat every morning would drive him to despair. He wasn't the type of guy who could live in a world where the thrill of the hunt was cut short and they handed him the prize on a platter. He couldn't have his cake and eat it without suffering for it first. He couldn't enjoy the simple things in life without knowing he deserved them.

And his current state of mind would only personify these beliefs, tearing the walls down from the inside, exposing his mind, letting the demons loose. But could they all just sit by and let him slip through their fingers, just like . . .

"Rude's dead." Tseng shouted above the rising clamour inside his own head.

He tried to continue, but it felt as though his throat was thick with treacle, making his words heavy and hard to choke out. Elena recoiled as though she'd been shot, placing her hands over her ears, biting down on her tongue and shaking her head wildly. Even Rufus froze. Neither Tifa, nor Vincent, nor even Cloud could say the news surprised them. And yet despite already knowing they still felt the bottom drop out of their stomachs.

It had been said. Therefore now, it must be true.

Reno surfaced from his nightmares and broke through the thin veil of oblivion and landed back into reality. For the first time since he'd closed his eyes as Tseng's bullet had torn through his leg, Reno felt **real **pain. The sort of pain that cuts you in half, has you screaming for more just so you know you're still alive. Roaring like an animal deranged, Reno thrashed and writhed, fighting off these new fiends, the demons in disguise. Those white clad devils with their safe, latex gloves and their secure, clean face masks. The monsters that pretended to help you by slicing through your skin, bleeding you dry then stitching you back together.

That was when they appeared. Like a burst of light in the dark. A beacon of hope. They steadied him and soothed him with their treacherous words, those backstabbing fiends he'd called his friends had managed to worm their way into his heart again. And now they rocked him, they refused to let the monsters in white put him under again, they hung on, shackling him to reality. Right now, Reno could forgive them anything, even if it meant sacrificing the rest of his sanity, if he could be happy again, he'd even give his life.

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Neko-Jin: Well, that was depressing to write. :'  
Listening to Three Days Grace 'Never too Late' and P.O.D's 'Not your kind' as I wrote it though. Brilliant songs both of them, you should check them out, after you've reviewed that is ;D

Oh! By the way, I thought I should just mention there is **ONE** more chapter to this twisted tale, and hopefully it won't be as heavy going as this one or its predecessor :)

Penny for your thoughts?


	3. My Brother in arms

Title: Drowned in a Sea of Insanity

Author: Neko-Jin of the stars

Summary: Unhinged and desperate Reno needs help, and as his condition rapidly worsens who will be left to pick up the pieces, because somebody is going to suffer.

A/N: La finale- All questions answered hopefully, and maybe everything won't look quite so bleak anymore.

Disclaimer: I own nothing affiliated with any of the Final Fantasies what-so-ever. (Unfortunately!)

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He was late. For the first time ever he was late for a meeting with the president. A phone rang, he instantly switched it to loudspeaker, he wanted everyone to hear the excuse of a lifetime.

"Hey, Reno that y-"  
"Yo Rude, seriously where the hell are ya? Oh wait! Let me guess, you finally scored with that Tifa chick at seventh heaven? I knew it you big ol' perv you!""Reno. If you'd let me finish….Reno I don't think I'm going to be around for much longer I-""What the hell dude, you're not here now! So come on and get your big, bald butt over he-""Reno look out of the window, you're in the presidents office right? You might as well tell the others to do the same." After being interrupted yet again by that same oddly calm voice filled with enough tension it could bend steel, the red head quickly herded his fellow Turks to the large window.

"Now Reno, tell me if you can see a large, black company van headed south of Midgar. I'm just passing what's left of sector seven." Reno scoured the city from his vantage point in the highest office in the Shinra building. From way up here everything looked like one of those miniature toy towns. Reno felt strangely uneasy but quickly masked it with some faux cheerful whistling.  
"Oh hey yeah found ya, I just looked for the enormous blind spot in my vision thanks to your beautifully blinding baldness. So what up?" He heard Rude chuckle quietly to himself. Something was wrong. Rude. Didn't. Chuckle. Just like he didn't not turn up for very important meetings.

"Now Reno listen to me, it's important. I, I found a bomb in the Shinra building. Something was interfering with the connection in the place and messing up signals etcetera, and I traced it back to a bomb. I have to get rid of it. There's enough untapped and unrefined Mako in here to flatten half of Midgar so I have to get it out of the city."

Suddenly, everything in the office seemed to gain so much more clarity. The air the red head breathed grew clearer, almost to the point were it cut his throat, and the words his best friend spoke grew sharper, ripping through his mind.

"Yeah but Rude dude, you can just dump this thing and get the hell back right? I mean, you're an expert on bombs, you like, practically invented them, if you can't disarm it then shit man… So how long ya gonna be?" His hollow words seemed to make an impression in the atmosphere, the simple question hung there unanswered.

"Rude?"

"Reno. I'm not coming back. There's no way I can get far en-"  
"Bull shit! 'Course you can get back you're just screwin' with me! So come on Rude how long?" Reno heard his friend sigh, he saw his friends; Tseng, Elena even Rufus staring fixedly out of the window. They already knew. Reno didn't.

"Reno listen to what I have to say, and please don't interrupt. This is it for me, the end of the line. By the time I get far away enough from the city so the blast radius has no effect, I'm not going to be able to make it back in time. Reno I'm going to die. But you're not, and neither are Elena, or Tseng, or Rufus, the people that matter are going to live, so I don't care that this is the end.

Do you remember all the good times we've had over the years? Do you remember when you rode that bright red chocobo through the Shinra halls butt naked just because I dared you too? And the time you painted that guys entire office completely black, desk, chairs and computer included because he made a racist comment about me and I let it slide? And the time we turned up drunk to work and the only reason you got caught and I didn't was because you'd stripped down to your boxers and knocked yourself out running into Tseng's office door. And when you finally woke up you were completely naked and duck taped to the revolving doors in the main entrance? No actually, maybe you don't remember that one, but I do Reno, I remember them all.

You've always been there, I couldn't have got rid of you if I'd wanted too. And I think that you're the reason I survived so long, you and the others. Without Tseng's constant reprimands, Elena's constant nagging and your idiocy, I think this place might have killed me a long time ago. So thanks Reno, thanks all of you for making these past ten years with the Turks the best I've ever had. You're the only family I ever cared about."

_'Please don't go on. Please, just shut up I don't want to hear it. I can't listen anymore.'_ The group assembled high in that concrete prison thought in unison.

"Elena remember you're not a rookie anymore, you're one of the finest Turks we've ever seen, although Reno'll never admit it. So please don't go home crying anymore because you think you'll never amount to what your family expects you to, because believe me you've done more in your twenty two years than your entire family probably has in their entire lives.

Tseng I know one day you'll be able to return to Wutai with no feelings of shame and with no regrets for anything you may have done in the past, and I know your family will welcome you back, they'd be fools not too. I just want to thank you for all those years ago when you took me from that gang and showed me another way, when you gave me another chance at life.

And Reno?"

Overcoming the sob that threatened to escape his gaping mouth Reno managed a feeble "yes" before thrusting his knuckles into his mouth, forcing his teeth down on them to choke back the tears.

"Reno I want you to stop destroying your body. If it's one thing I can do for you now it'll be to finally tell you enough is enough. It's not a vanity thing I know. You don't make yourself sick after every meal because you want others approval, you do it because it reminds you of what it was like when you were a slum rat. You do it because you feel guilty for getting away from it all, for getting a life and having the luxuries you never even dreamed of having when you were a kid. But you need to stop." Teeth broke the skin. The crimson Turk ignored the pain that flared across his knuckles and pretended not to notice the bloody rivulets ebbing over his scarlet stained lips.

"Oh, and one last thing partner. If you ever use anybody else's toothbrush to clean the toilet with, then put it back for them to use, I swear I'll let rip some divine whoop ass on your scrawny soul."

It wasn't like anybody knew what to say, or how to even go about saying it. What do you say when your best friend tells you they're about to die, but you refuse to believe it. What do you say to the friend that's collapsed in a heap next to you, because she didn't know that somebody knew, or cared enough about what happened to her when she left work. And what do you do when you see the walls fall down behind your bosses eyes, the one person you thought was unbreakable. What do you do when you find yourself with your nosed crushed up against the glass, your phone pressed against your ear so hard it's in danger of becoming a permanent fixture, and your lips unable to mouth the words goodbye.

"Well, it looks like this is it. Goodbye, all of y-"  
He was cut off, but Reno hadn't spoken. He hadn't said goodbye, he hadn't said a word. All the windows in all of Midgar rattled and shook in their panes. And the blast never came.

"NO, NO YOU CAN'T GO RUDE, I WON'T LET YOU! It's, it-it isn't your time to go Rude, no. Rude it's not your time to go. I DIDN'T SAY GOODBYE I DIDN'T EVEN SAY GOODBYE!" Reno screeched, hysterics finally claiming him. He screamed it down the phone until his voice cracked and he coughed up more blood, he screamed it at the friends who tried to calm him, who took all his blows and verbal attacks without uttering a word against him, and who cradled him and rocked him into something like peace. He screamed the word as much as he could to anyone he could because he knew he'd never get to say it again to the person that really mattered. To Rude, his friend, his pretend brother, his drinking buddy and his co-worker. He only wanted to say goodbye.

And then the world fell down around his ears and everything went black.

Then the Turk woke up.

The flashback finally faded away leaving his frail body empty and numb. And yet he didn't feel that overwhelming despair, the chill that froze him to his very core that usually came with the mention of his deceased brother in arms. He feebly raised his head and glanced round his cell, only dimly aware he was awake again. He let his gaze linger on the photographs adorning his otherwise barren room, his eyes remained on one in particular. There they were, all five of them. Himself, Rude, Tseng, Elena and Rufus. His family, the only family that mattered. And to the right of it was another photo, the avalanche team, with a sincere 'get well' from the entire group scrawled on the other side.

He smiled as he swung his legs over the bed and pushed the cell door open. He smiled as he walked down the ward with one of the nurses latched onto his arm, kindly leading him to the recreational room, even though he already knew where it was. He even smiled when they gave him all those pills and made him open his mouth afterwards to make sure he'd taken them all. He smiled because today his family were visiting.

And even though he hated the clinical smell that stuck to everything in the building, and even though he hated having to stay in somewhere that's name ended in 'asylum', and even though he hated what he'd become, he looked forward to the future. He wanted to live. He wanted to see his friends again and he wanted to be another normal person again. Reno knew deep down he could never really be the man he once was, he knew the pills would have a lasting effect in the long run and he knew there was no job waiting for him when he got out. Because a crazy person was a liability, or so he'd been told. But none of that really bothered him right now because whilst he might not technically belong to the Turks anymore he knew he was still a Turk at heart.

So he felt no guilt whatsoever when he broke into the asylum staff's bathroom and cleaned each toilet thoroughly with each of their toothbrushes before replacing them. Grinning slightly, he waited for the divine ass whooping to commence.

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Neko-Jin: **FINALLY **the end is here! Hope you liked it! I think I tied up all the loose ends and I'd like to believe it ended as happily as I could possibly allow giving reno's craziness J. And as you all well know by now comments and criticism are always much appreciated.

I'd also like to know if anybody thinks I should maybe continue this or make a spin off etc… I dunno, I'll leave it upto you J


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